1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to methods of dynamic load planning and billing used by less-than-a-load (LTL) carriers and more particularly, to a method for transmitting shipping documents or bills of lading directly from the truck driver to a common point or terminal so that billing and load planning can be accomplished while the load is being delivered from the customer.
2. General Background
The shipping industry consists primarily of three types of carriers, each offering services that satisfy different customer needs. There are small package carriers like Federal Express, United Parcel Service and others who pick up small packages, consolidate these packages into large loads, move them close to their destination point and then deliver the packages. At the opposite end of the shipping business are the large customers which fill entire trucks or trailer loads and are considered to be truck load shippers. The category in between the truck load shippers and the small package shippers are less-than-a-load (LTL) carriers. Similar to the UPS driver who collects and delivers many small packages during a business day, the less-than-a-load (LTL) carrier picks up freight from upwards of 20 different customers. This freight is typically destined to many different locations around the country. The freight is brought back to a terminal where the shipments are unloaded from the truck, consolidated with other freight moving in the same direction and then reloaded on delivery trucks. The freight is sorted and consolidated into truck loads at the terminal to minimize the empty space on the truck that will transport the freight from the local terminal to either a local delivery or a distribution terminal in another city or state. At the distribution terminal the truck will be unloaded and its freight restored and reconsolidated for delivery to customers in the local area around the distribution terminal or shipment to another distribution terminal.
Each individual shipment is governed by a separate contract called a “bill of lading”. Often, customers will have their own bill of lading form that they use for shipping. Thus, over the course of a day a truck driver may collect many different bill of lading forms, one for each shipment. As in any business, efficiency and speed are measuring sticks for customer service. As an internal matter, as with any other business, the faster payment is received, the better the cash flow. The speed and efficiency of these processes are what gives a trucking or other carrier a competitive edge. Typically, a truck driver will leave the truck terminal in the morning and return in the evening. When he returns he has a hand full of bill of lading forms and other paper work which is submitted to the corporate office where it is processed by billing clerks using data entry skills. After the information from each bill of lading is entered, the shipping information is transmitted to the loading dock at the terminal so that the freight moving to common points can be consolidated and the delivery schedule planned.
The goal of proper load planning is to deliver the freight on time with the delivery truck leaving the terminal with a full load. Unfortunately, both the truck used to pick up the freight and the truck used to deliver the freight are often sitting idle at the terminal while the data entry and load planning functions are being performed. Additionally, because the freight typically comes in one truck at a time the loading dock may not know in advance of the trucks' arrival at the terminal or the contents and the destination of the freight picked up on a given day. Consequently, a delivery truck will often depart the terminal only partially loaded. Many of these partially loaded trucks could have been fully loaded had the load planner known about unscheduled freight that had been picked up and would soon arrive at the terminal. This movement of freight as partial also results in decreased efficiency, increased costs and reduced profits for the trucking company.
Computer software has been developed to perform load and shipping planning functions. U.S. Pat. No. 5,265,006 titled “DEMAND SCHEDULED PARTIAL CARRIERS LOAD PLANNING SYSTEM FOR THE TRANSPORTATION INDUSTRY” is an example of this type of software. Load planning software, while reducing the time expended in planning shipments, is unable by itself to reduce the inefficiency caused by partial loads that could have been full loads due to unscheduled freight, since this freight would not have been entered into the computer program.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,168,444 (Cukor), titled “SHIPMENT SYSTEM INCLUDING PROCESSING OF DOCUMENT IMAGES”, illustrates a system where the bills of lading are faxed from local shipping terminals to the shipping company's headquarters. At headquarters, where the data entry clerks could be supervised, a data entry clerk views the image of the bill of lading and enters the appropriate information in to the billing and accounting database. This system while using a fax machine, still requires that the truck driver return to a terminal before the shipping documents are sent to the company headquarters. Thus, while this system may reduce the errors made by the data entry personnel, it does not reduce the inefficiencies caused by the data entry clerks waiting for a driver to arrive at a terminal with the bills of lading and fax the bills of lading to headquarters, or the inefficiency caused by the driver waiting for the load planning to be completed.